As organisations increasingly go digital and HR's role morphs to encompass technology, transformation, and multiple other mandates, the expectations placed on HR leaders rise substantially. How does the role of HR change in such an environment? Leaders offered some suggestions to help HR professionals adapt in a power panel at People Matters TechHR 2023.

Bring in the business language

Moderated by Carmistha Mitra, Group Chief Learning Officer of Axis Bank and subsidiaries, the discussion went straight to the need for HR to speak the same business language as CEOs and CFOs: to understand the business model and how the company makes money, to know the financials.

"As HR folks, we really need to understand the context of our organisation and what makes sense for the business lines," commented Girish Menon, Head of HR at Swiggy. "Go from being a policy person to a people developer. Listen to the employees, understand what's happening on the ground, co-create policies."

"I would urge our HR heads to start thinking of themselves as general managers. When they know the context, that will help take culture forward. You can't do culture without understanding the business."

Agreeing, Anjali Chatterjee, CHRO of Air Asia, stated firmly that HR people must start understanding numbers - specifically business financials.  "Understand the business; understand the finance; understand how you make profit," she said.

"Co-create so that every HR leader becomes a business head, and every business head becomes a HR leader."

Those conversations, held regularly, said Carmistha Mitra, are what will help develop mutual appreciation, respect, and good working relationships between these greatly different functions.

The 3 E's - from both ends of the spectrum

Going beyond these basics of relationship building and communication, though, HR leaders still need a way to factor in changing expectations and demands. Ashwani Prashara, CHRO-Hydrocarbons, Reliance Industries, encapsulated this in a simple summary:

"We are in an environment of tsunamic disruption; workplace has changed, workforce has changed, lives have changed, and what's most important for us to understand is mindset has changed," he said.

He highlighted a simple mantra of three E's that leaders need to pay especial attention to: environment, equity, engagement.

Environment means making the organisation into the kind of place that people want to work in, safe, secure, respectful, and encouraging; equity means ensuring that everyone has the chance to succeed, being one step up from simple equal treatment; and engagement is all about connecting with the heart. "I strongly believe if you get the heart, you get the mind," he commented.

Girish Menon also offered three E's, but coming from the perspective of a much smaller, faster-moving startup still in the hyperactive stage of high growth and experimentation: enthalpy or the release of energy, entropy or the beginning of chaos, and economy. Where the first three E's were goals to be attained, these three are more like influencing factors: things that shape the culture of a company and the expectations of its people, and must be factored in as HR leaders proceed with the building of strategy.